Confessions of an Indian ambassador

Serving the country on foreign soil means perks and pressures the rest of us don’t see

Behind the glamour “All new Indian Foreign Service (IFS) recruits undergo a comprehensive two-year training programme, which covers aspects such as foreign trade, economic developments, Indian history, India’s key relationships with major countries, cultural diplomacy, security and defence. We are also given a thorough briefing of our own administrative and finance rules and regulations, and taken on familiarisation tours to various parts of India and to forward-deployment areas—where the army is stationed along a border. Then, once we’re allotted a language, we spend about six months training in that specific division before finally being posted.”

“There’s not too much individual prep at a junior level, but once you’re an ambassador, you have to spend time learning about the political and economic situations in the country you’re going to. I’d speak with people from FICCI and CII who are experts on that region, learn about trade disputes, the country’s defence and security policies—any issues that are relevant between that nation and India.”

“It’s definitely not as glamorous as people think it is. We don’t all travel First Class or get to keep our diplomatic passports for life—only those at the level of Secretary to the government (and their spouses) get that privilege. All official travel is on Air India, and only a few countries have separate queues for diplomatic passport-holders at airports. Also, it’s a myth we are exempt from security checks and frisking.”

“Yes, the houses we get to live in are very nice, but maintaining them is a lot of work. Sure, in the evening, when you’re hosting an official reception, they may look beautiful, but in the day, you see all their warts. Many are heritage properties and need a great deal of care, but it’s not easy to be able to afford house help abroad. The guy I took with me from India, for example, had to be taught how to clean a fireplace, which he’d never seen in his life!”

“Those official dinners are a nightmare! They’re very stressful—you need to plan the seating chart in such a way that two men and two women are not next to each other, to maintain the gender balance (which means that if one guest cancels at the last minute, you have to redo the whole thing), that people who can’t stand each other are seated separately—and being the ambassador, you can’t keep leaving the room to go check on what’s happening in the kitchen.”

“Once, I received an invitation to dinner from another ambassador, who wasn’t too comfortable with English—the invitation card said ‘Dress: Optional’. The poor guy got a lot of amused phone calls from all us other diplomats, asking what exactly he meant!”

Living in troubled or hostile countries is scary “When you’re in a war-torn country or one that’s hostile to India, your responsibility towards the Indian community there increases hugely, and that can be scary.”

“Countries like Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka have so many linguistic and cultural affinities with India, but in most cases, they accuse us of adopting a Big Brother of the Subcontinent approach, and as the ambassador, you’re the face of their issues with India. I’ve had shoes thrown at me, people have conducted dharnas outside Indian missions.”

“There’s definitely a sense of unease, especially in countries where internal violence is a daily matter. IEDs can go off anywhere, you could even be a target. I was posted in Kabul when I got a message from the headquarters, who, based on intelligence inputs, cautioned me against accepting any invitation to a particular lakeside restaurant. Two days later, I got exactly such an invitation.”

But it does make for memorable stories “On one of my early postings, I invited a diplomat from another country and his wife home for dinner. Conversation turned to the state of Indian politics when the guy suddenly declared that he was one of the people who had assassinated his own head of state!”

“In Pakistan, we had some guards from the ISI permanently stationed outside our house, with a scooter and one small car, and they would follow us everywhere we went. My kids would walk to the video rental shop every weekend, and sure enough, one of those guys would tail them, wait outside the shop for them to finish choosing their video, then go in and rent the one they’d just returned and show it to his superiors. Which means those guys watched a lot of Tom & Jerry cartoons! We never exchanged a word, it was tacitly understood that we knew who they were, and they were just doing their job, after all. My wife would even send tea out for them in winter.”

Indian politicians! “Often, Indian politicians visiting another country just want to display their own importance, and if they are clueless about political and cultural sensitivities, it can be really embarrassing. Once, an Indian political leader came to an event in Kabul—she went on and on about how she had such fond memories of Afghanistan and had been such good friends with Najibullah—and this, to the guys who had fought his Communist rule for decades!”

“Another time, an Indian politician in Nepal spoke at length about the close Indo-Nepal ties and how India has always had a great friendship with Nepal’s royal house—not something the newly elected Maoist government would like to hear.”

Being the face of your country is tough “You can never relax, never let your hair down. Especially if you’re a woman, there are a lot of male chauvinists constantly watching, waiting for you to make a mistake. You know the buck stops with you—you’re the face of your country, you fly the national flag on your car and house.”

“Being an ambassador is a massive PR exercise. Often, when you’re posted in a country that has a warped view of yours, you need to step in for damage control. When the 16 December bus gangrape happened in 2012, I had to go on public record in the country I was posted to, and say that all Indian men aren’t rapists, that to call Delhi the rape capital of India is unfair, that this kind of thing does happen elsewhere, too.”

The travel takes its toll “Being on the move every two—three years is not easy, especially if you don’t know where you’ll be posted next. Marriages suffer, because frankly, being a diplomat’s spouse is a full-time job, so if one’s spouse is a professional who can’t keep relocating and restarting work in different countries, there’s tension and resentment, or you end up with a long-distance relationship.”

“Even in terms of raising kids, there are a lot of decisions that hinge on your next posting and what kind of opportunities they’ll have there—where they should go to school, for example. And moving every few years means they don’t get a sense of rootedness to their country, of stability, of family. They lose out on bonding with cousins or school friends in their formative years.”

“I love that I get a real sense of the world, a proper, actual worldview, but I do feel like a gypsy, not rooted. Even today, I hate the sight of a carton.”

“You have to constantly watch your back, and can’t ever relax, because someone’s always waiting to pull you down. It’s hard because you lose out on your youth. But it’s a choice I made when I decided to serve my country, and it’s one I’m extremely proud of.”

Based on conversations with multiple Indian ambassadors who’ve served across the world